The Comet
by foodeatsyou
Summary: Ten years before the events of the Last Airbender, taking place in our world right at the start of the Great War, this is the story told by Bato, of the Southern Water tribe.
1. Chapter 1

**My outlook on what would happen if Avatar: The Last Airbender took place in our world with our rules. (the backstory) this is my first story so cut me some slack for Christ's sakes!**

Date: July 21, 2010

Location: Sydney international airport

Time: 6:40 pm

**Part 1**

The blue and white South Arctic Airways Boeing 767-300ER was third in line for takeoff. Bato nervously looked at the clock in the back of the cockpit. 6:41, just 30 minutes since the nuclear attack warnings were transmitted on every TV and radio station in Australia. Since then, airplanes were eagerly trying to get clearance to takeoff. Each plane was full of people wanting to leave the city. Even cargo planes were being used to carry people. Bato looked to his left at Captain Brad Smith, the pilot. Bato had flown flights for South Arctic Airlines with the captain since he first met him. Unlike Bato, Captain Smith was born and raised in the United States and had migrated down to Australia to find work as a pilot. He had been promoted to captain the same time that Bato was made a copilot. The man was not new to the job like Bato was. He had been a pilot for 25 years before Bato came along. Whenever the two of them flew together he often found himself being correcting for his mistakes a lot. Today however was different. Today there was no room for mistakes. Just half an hour ago, the government of the air nation confederacy sent out a warning that nuclear missiles had been launched from the fire nation in china, and that these missiles were aimed at major cities along the Australian coast. Now everyone was trying to leave the populated areas of the country. But what worried Bato the most was not impending nuclear doom. No, his thoughts lay with whether or not his childhood friend and his family had made it onboard. Just a few hours ago, Bato had learned that Hakota, his wife, and their two kids were returning home from a vacation in Sydney. An event that Bato and Captain Smith were looking forward to since they would be flying them back home to Antarctica. But now with the current crises, Bato was beginning to wonder whether they boarded or not in the chaos. To ease his anxiety, Bato grabbed the cockpit phone, put it to his ear and dialed the galley. After a few seconds the head flight attendant answered. "What is it?" she said in her raspy, elderly voice.

"Bettie, could you check our passenger manifest for a family of four. Two parents, a daughter, and son and see if they are onboard. They're on the VIP list, under Chief Hakota of the southern water tribe." After a few seconds of silence, Bettie replied.

"Um, my attendants made an announcement asking for their names and no one has come forward. If there on the VIP list, shouldn't we head back to the gate?" Bato thought hard about Bettie's question. By going back to the gate they would lose their place in line and would have to wait longer to take off, putting the entire aircraft and its passengers at risk. But Bato had no intention of letting his friends become trapped here at the mercy of the oncoming danger. He decided to ask the captain what to do, since this was his aircraft and he made the calls.

"Hey Smith, Bettie told me that Hakota, Kiya and the kids didn't make it on board. Should we turn back?" After a moment of silence from the captain he said:

"I'm sorry Bato, but we can't. The tower isn't letting any more airplanes leave the gate. And we just got a report from the Sydney civil defense station." Smith immediately pointed to the computer screen for the planes communication devices. On the screen was a nuclear attack update from the civil defense showing the ETA of the nuclear missiles, including a missile directed for Sydney itself. Next to the name was a timeline that said: "50 minutes to impact." Then the captain said:

"I'm sorry, but there's nothing we can do. If we don't go now we could all be killed." At that moment the two airplanes in front of them, a FedEx dc-10 with its white painted fuselage and purple tale, and a sandy colored Confederacy Airways 747 jumbo jet with the iconic blue air bending arrow going down its back pointing at the nose, begin to move. The FedEx plane moved on to the runway where it turned into position, throttled its three engines, and began moving down the runway, leaving the two remaining planes left on the taxi way. Hesitantly, Bato lifted his foot off the brake pedal as the captain pushed up the engine throttles slightly to move the plane behind the 747 in front of them. Bato could feel the weight of this new information sink into his mind. He was leaving his closest friend, and his family, behind to a fate he couldn't dare to think about. But he had to consider the safety of the passengers who were on board. Soon the 747 moved onto the runway and took off to. Now it was their turn.

The captain once again pushed the throttle to move the plane to the end of the taxi way, where they started their turn onto the runway. Bato looked out the window towards the terminal, what would undoubtedly be his last sight of the airport forever. But as he was watching the building he noticed movement on the pavement between the terminal and the plane. It was coming from four shadowy figures that Bato had trouble seeing due to the overcast weather blocking the sun. But as they got closer, Bato realized there was a group of people running towards the 767. He turned towards the captain to inform him so he could call security, but then something familiar about the figures caught his eyes. They were all wearing what appeared to be blue coats, and they all had black hair. "No way," Bato said out loud, not even trying to be quiet. The captain heard him and turned to see what he was talking about. Immediately he knew what Bato was concerned about.

"Hakota, Kiya. What are they all doing out there?!"

"I don't know" Bato replied. The captain immediately throttled down the engines and hit the brakes. Now the four of them were on the taxiway, right in front of the plane, waving to get their attention. Captain Smith spoke through the radio to the ATC.

"Sydney tower, South Arctic 2378, aborting the taxi we have people on the tarmac, Stand by." Then the captain got up from his seat and moved to the back of the cockpit.

"What are you doing?" Bato asked in confusion.

"Don't you think we should let them onboard, it wouldn't hurt to" the captain replied as he lend down to the floor and grabbed a small handle. He pulled on it and lifted a small trapdoor that led down to a compartment. Then, he stepped into the compartment and began to fumble with another door. After a few seconds there was a loud "click" and the sound of the door opening to the outside. Bato could hear the sound of the engines with their high pitched metallic roar. Just over the engines he heard the captain yelling to Hakota and his family. "Come on in, we got to go now!" then Bato saw, out the cockpit window, the four people disappear under the airplane nose. Then the captain claimed back into the cockpit, this time helping up Hakota's wife, Kiya. She was wearing a plain blue water tribe coat and her jet black hair was pulled back in a bun, yet it looked like her hair was out of place and she was breathing quickly from exhaustion. Next her daughter Katara climbed up. She looked just like her mother, even with her outfit. except she was shorter, being only five years old now, and her hair was tied up in a long ponytail with two locks of hair streaming from her forehead to the back of her head. Then her brother Sokka came up. His hair was incredibly short save for a portion at the back that was tied up into a very rough ponytail. And surprisingly when standing next to his younger sister Katara, he seemed shorter than her. He was also holding a metallic boomerang in his hand. Then, Hakota emerged wearing a water tribe warrior uniform and a relived look on his face.

"Thanks for the ride captain, I didn't think we could catch up to you in time," Hakota said as the captain reached into the lower compartment and closed the outside door. Next, he closed the outer door, stood up and spoke. "Hakota, Kiya, take the kids to the cabin and find a seat in the back. We are leaving." The four family members departed through the cockpit door into the passenger cabin.

The captain turned around, strapped himself to his seat on the left side, and called the tower. "South Arctic 2378, crises averted. We just took on more passengers and are awaiting takeoff clearance" there was a moment of silence followed by a response.

"_South Arctic 2378, cleared for takeoff, and get in the air ASAP. We just received word that a nuke has detonated five miles off the coast. The bomb has displaced a large amount of ocean water, and the coast guard is declaring a tsunami warning. You've got two minutes!" _ The captain gave no hesitation to the message. He pushed the throttles enough to give them driving speed. Then, using the landing gear steering wheel, he maneuvered the jet onto the runway, into position and stopped the plane, But before he could push the throttle to full power, the cockpit door opened and Kiya and Katara stepped in, then Kiya spoke up.

"Bato, there are only two seats left in the back. The boys offered to stand up during the flight. Can they do that?" Bato turned to face her.

"That's not a good idea. Wait, I got it! You two could sit up here in the jump seat." Bato pointed to the unoccupied seat behind the captain seat. It was just big enough for Kiya to sit in it. Katara ended up sitting on her lap with her arms around her mom's neck.

"Ok, now that that's settled, let's get out of here." Captain Smith said. But as he said this, Bato heard the sound of yelling over his radio from ATC. "_**South Arctic 2378 get off the runway! That wave is right behind you! For the spirits sake, MOVE!" **_the captain reacted quickly to the orders.

"Bato, give me power." Bato reached over and pushed the throttle to 85 percent power, the standard power setting for the Boeing 767 at takeoff. The plane began to move, slowly at first, but it soon picked up speed and momentum. Bato's initial feeling was that of calmness. That they were going to make it, until he saw something out the back part of the window that made his stomach do a belly flop. It was the mother of all waves just behind them. And it was _fast_. He could see it consuming buildings and houses next to the runway at the speed of a bullet. It was destroying everything in its path like some ancient spirit monster. Bato turned to the captain who also was noticing the wall of watery death in his window. His face turned as White as a ghost, and he yelled just one word. "**Accelerate!**" Bato reached for the throttle again, but this time he pushed it to its max setting.

Immediately the engines roared to life and the G-forces began to push him into his seat. The plane sped up, going faster and faster. Behind them, destruction rained as other planes on the taxiway were consumed by the monster wave. After a few seconds the captain tried to rotate, or lift the nose up. But there was no movement, and they were running out of runway and time quickly. He tried again too little success "UP, UP, come on baby, come on!" In the back, Bato could hear Katara crying out in fear.

"Mom, I'm scared" her mother hugged her and said.

"It's ok sweety, everything will be fine" the captain tried to rotated the plane once again. This time the nose slowly lifted up. But at the same time Bato felt the wave impact the tail of the plane slightly. In the back, the passengers near the tail could be heard screaming at the sight of water splashing just beneath their windows. Bato and the captain struggled to keep the plane straight as the planes main landing gear finally left the ground. Then the plane's tail broke free of the wave base and flight 2378 became the last airliner to leave Sydney international airport forever.


	2. Chapter 2

_**Read.**_

As the plane started to gain altitude, the captain called out. "Landing gear up" Bato reached for a small lever on his side and pushed into the up position. There was a slight bump fallowed by a mechanical noise outside, the sound of the gear locking into place under the fuselage. Then the captain typed in a series of numbers into the auto pilot. Finally he pushed the auto pilot engage button and let go of the control column. The planes yoke started to turn the aircraft to the left until they were flying south. Then the computer reduced engine speed and began to level off. Now Bato, Captain Smith, Kiya, and Katara could see the devastation of the city. The wave had come to a stop, but over half the city was flattened and destroyed. The entire coast was demolished. In the distance they could see small grayish red mushroom clouds rising from other cities. The horizon was alight with an orange red radioactive glow, as well as fogged up with the smog of ash and debris. Bato saw the captain lean his head down to whisper a prayer. "may the great spirits of the earth protect those who we left behind" as the captain finished, There a break in the clouds Bato saw something that answered most of the questions that had been going over in his mind for the past hour. A giant fiery streak of light high up in the atmosphere with a red fireball in front and a yellow tail leading behind it, all moving slowly across the sky. Then the captain broke the silence

"the Great Comet, but how? I though it wasn't supposed to return for another six years? What's it doing here?!" Captain Smith was right; while the comets presence could explain the fire nation's rash attack. The question of how it arrived at early so early had no answer.

Then surprisingly Kiya spoke up. "What does it matter? We can find out when we get home. Bato, can you contact anyone on the radio, anyone who can tell us if the southern water tribe has been hit?" Bato looked down at the radio control set between the pilot and copilot seat. The screen showed that all the radio channels were in-active. But the suddenly, the emergency channel lit up with a transmission. Bato pointed this out to Captain Smith

"Hey, captain we have a transmission on the emergency channel" the captain looked at the computer screen and taped the keyboard to play the message. Suddenly there was the beeping noise of an EBT. Then a recorded voce spoke from the radio: "_this is an emergency broadcast transmitted at the request of the United States government. President John McCain will be addressing the citizens of the eastern and western earth nation alliances, as well as the northern and southern water tribe colonies in one minute, please stand by."_

The captain looked up at Bato "could you tie this in to the cabin loud speaker. The passengers need to hear this" Bato nodded and began to work on the radio. At the same time, Captain Smith grabbed the cabin microphone and spoke to the passengers. "Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking. We are getting some new information on the situation. It seems the president of the United States will be speaking soon and we will have his announcement over the loudspeaker in just a few moments." The captain hung up the microphone and turned back to Bato. "You got the adjustments done?" Bato nodded as he finished with the radio. After a few seconds the EBT beeping sound came up on the speakers again. Now, however, Bato could hear the sound coming from the speakers in the passenger cabin to. Then, the voice of an announcer came up.

"_Ladies and gentlemen, the president of the united states" _There was a moment of silence, and then: "_People of the earth alliance and the water tribes. I am sure many of you have speculated about what has happened in the past few hours. All I can say is that most people's speculations don't even come close to describing the horror that has been unleashed on our world. Here's what we know: at 1810 hours, alliance satellites detected the launce of 24 ICBM's from china. 20 of these missiles contained nuclear warheads inbound for Australia. When they made landfall, dozens of cities of the air nation confederacy were incinerated. In just 5 minutes over 43 billon people are believed to have been killed. At the same time the other four ICBM's were fitted with advanced biological warheads. These missiles carried their weapons to the four great air nomad temples were they unleashed there payloads, killing everything. Recent search and rescue teams have been unable to locate the new avatar among the ruins leading world leaders to assume that the avatar may be amongst the dead. _

_Less than 1 hour after this attack, fire nation ground forces from western Russian and southern china launched devastating offensives against earth nation territory in: the Middle East, Europe, and Southeast Asia as well as fire nation navy attacks in the pacific and Atlantic ocean. Everyone lessening to this message is probably asking the same question. What do we do now...? Do we surrender…? Do we wait for the avatar to return…? I think those would be the easy paths. During the Vietnam War a friend of mine once told me that I should always look to my goals before getting up from bed every day. Did I what to make a difference today, or did I just want to get out alive? Today, despite what has happened I think the goal of this alliance shines more clearly then the full moon in the night sky. It resides within us all: and in our bunkers… in our silos… in our factories… in our warships… in our planes… in our helicopters… in our tanks… in our missiles… in our bombs… in our guns… and in our bending. War is our initiative. It is now our responsibility to fight to bring peace and balance back to this world. So now I ask the leaders of free nations to join us. Earth nations and water tribe colonizes let us unite together as one people, one race, one nation. To quote Charles Chaplin, the kingdom of heaven is within men. Not one man or a group of men, but in all men, and you. Let us put aside petty differences and work together to protect our rights as human beings. Let us fight for liberty, freedom, compassion and mercy. Let us not wander from the path of humility and kindness like our enemies have. Let us keep our heads in balance with our hearts. Let us fight for the goodness in men wall we are still here on earth, no matter how long it takes. __**All people, let us unite!**__" _

3 hours later. 

It was night fall now with the crescent moon casting its eerie glow against the 767s blue and white color scheme as they cruised through the air. They were 30 minutes out from Antarctica international airport when they received their first call from the airport ATC. "_South Artic 2378, welcome to the south pole. Descend to 10000 feet and prepare for final approach. Wall you're doing that could you report your passenger count and whether or not you have injured onboard"_ Bato responded to the controller "Antarctica international, our head count is 250 passengers. No injures"

The controller responded "_roger South Artic 2378, you are clear to enter southern water tribe airspace" _after Bato finished his conversation the captain spoke up.

"Antarctica international, can you tell us anything about the attack so far."

"_Negative, we have no further information. We have been unable to get in touch with the rest of the nations at all. All our communications can't get thru and we don't know why. Authorities suspect an attack by the fire nation will come soon. You probably would have been better off flying to Hawaii or India."_

"Affirmative, we only had enough fuel to fly here so the decision on where to go was obvious."

"_Roger, in that case have a safe flight and we will see you in a few minutes"_ the captain finished his conversation and turned his attention to the controls. Kiya and Katara both had left the cockpit after the president's announcement over the loudspeaker to go sit in the back. The cockpit was now deserted exempt for Bato and captain smith. All the passengers and crew had hardly said a word throughout the flight. The news about the attack and the loss of the avatar left many in a state of shock. The fire nation had done so much damage that it was hard for anyone to imagine the situation getting any worse. But now that they were approaching the South Pole, the atmosphere of the cabin was becoming more relaxed. Everyone couldn't wait to arrive. The captain, however, wasn't so confident.

"I can feel it Bato, something bad is going to happen. This is exactly like that time my mom surprised me with the announcement that she had volunteered me to join the swim team. Worst day of my life, and I felt it coming all day. Like some psychic curse. "

Bato found his friends' topic of conversation puzzling. "Sir, since when did your gut feelings about a reasonable decision your mom made eons ago have to do with the this event. If you ask me it will be all smooth sailing from here." As he said this, the plane dropped below the clouds and Bato's immediate though was wishing to himself that he hadn't said that. 10000 feet below them they could see 12 large sinister black ships racing across the ocean silhouetted against the light of the moon reflected on the ocean. With each one was creating a white water trail with their engines.

"Damn it Bato, why did you have to go and say that. Haven't you ever watched scary movies?"

Bato tried his best to apologize "Sorry sir, but we should probably try to gain some altitude so they don't see us" the captain nodded and reached for the throttle to increase speed. Bato deactivated the auto pilot and raised the nose of the plane so they could ascend. Then, the captain switched on the fasten seat belt lights in the cabin. The plane began to gain altitude until it was finally backed in the clouds.

"Did they see us?" the captain asked Bato as he reduced speed.

"We'll find out in a minute, wont we" Bato said as he looked out the window trying to see evidence that the fleet had indeed notice them. The cabin was quiet, save for the sound of the engines, for two minutes. Finally Captain Smith spoke up in a whisper. "I don't think they saw…" but before he could finish they both heard a distinct whistling nose from outside. It grew louder and louder until a bright orange fireball shot out of the dark clouds

_**"surface to air fire ball"**_ The captain screamed as he yanked the control stick to the right to avoid the burning projectile. The fireball missed them by a mere 10 feet and disappeared behind them. Suddenly a whole swarm of anti-air rockets shot through the clouds heeding strait towards them. The captain banked left and right in a desperate attempted to avoid them. Within 10 intense seconds, they had managed to avoid most of the projectiles. With the last one they were not so lucky. It exploded just 100 feet on the left side of the plane. The shockwave reverberated throughout the plane fallowed by a shudder of the hull as the metal was pressed by the pressure wave. The plane finally settled down, and it seemed like they were out of danger. But then Bato noticed an anomaly on the flight data computer screen. The number 1 engine was losing power. The thrust indicator dropped down to 30% before it finally stabilized.

Then the master caution alarm when off "Captain the left engine is malfunctioning, It must have been that missile. Should I commence shutdown of the engine sir?"

The captain turned to see the indicator for himself. "Well there's no engine fire, and the engine is still running. Leave it on. We're going to need all the speed we can get if we're going to outrun that fleet. In the meantime Bato, try to contact Antarctic international and tell them what's going on" the captain immediately unbuckled and claimed out of his seat.

"Sir what are you doing, this is hardly the time to take a stretch"

Captain Smith simply said "I am going to see how bad the engine is. If it's too damaged then we can turn it off." With that he opened the door and left the cockpit "Bato turned his attention to the radio

"South artic 2378, mayday, mayday. Antarctic international we are declaring an emergency. Our aircraft was attacked by a fleet of fire nation ships heeding for the capital." This time the voice of a different controller answered them.

"_South artic 2378, roger you are declaring an emergency. We know about the fleet. They were spotted just a few minutes ago. Do you have any idea about how many ships there are?_" "Antarctic international, affirmative, we can see a dozen ships at full steam for the tribe." "_South artic 2378, roger I'll get in touch with our people ASAP, continue you're…" _suddenly, in mid-sentence the captain stampeded thru the door and jumped in his seat at a speed only Legolas could have achieved.

Then he put on his headphones and joined in the conversation. "Antarctica international airport, we are not going to make the runway." The sentence was so shocking and surprising that neither Bato nor the controller said anything for many tense seconds.

Bato finally spoke. "What do you mean we can't make it to the airport?" but, Captain Smith replied only to the controller on the radio.

"Listen. We are leaking fuel from a giant hole in the left wing. We probably can only go for another 5 to 10 minutes. You need to prepare emergency ground crews. We're going to try to make for the shore, if we can't, just leave us. The fire nation will rescue us and take us prisoners."

The controller responded "_flight 2378, we won't leave you behind. Just tell us we're you're going to touch down and we will find you. Just maintain radio silence until you're below 1000 feet or the fleet can locate you." _

_ "_Appreciated Antarctic international" When the captain was finished, Bato immediately asked him.

"Sir, what are you talking about? This plane should have enough fuel to make it even if we are leaking."

But the captain only said grimly. "Bato we left Sidney with only 2/3's of a tank of fuel, Just enough to get here to this airport. But now we will probably run out before we even get near the airport." Bato simply nodded to his captain. Now was no time to panic. Together they had to make preparations. The captain grabbed the phone to call the flight attendants. While he was talking, Bato reached for the overhead controls to deploy the RAM air turbine, a small turbo fan that pops out under the fuselage between the wings that would spin in the wind and continue to provide electrical power to the plane even after the engines, their main power sources, ran out of fuel. This way Bato and Captain Smith would still have cabin lights and flight controls for a landing. As the captain finished talking to the flight attendants, he flipped a switch on the roof control panel labeled "midway fuel transfer valve" to the deactivated position. The valve was designed to allow fuel to travel between the left and right fuel tanks in the wings. Closing the valve would prevent fuel in the intact right tank from leaking out the damaged left tank. With all their safety precautions in place, the captain and Bato begin there decent towards the water tribe. At the same time they had to be careful not to descend below the clouds, until the last possible second, to avoided detection by the invading fire nation ships behind them. Suddenly, after just 1 minute of silence the number 1 engine, which had been struggling to stay running, finally shutdown. For a split second the lights in the cabin flickered as the engine on the left side sputtered and became silent. The captain looked at the computer screen that showed the planes internal readings. The fuel indicator for the left and right fuel tanks read; **left tank: 00000 pounds, right tank: 00029 pounds**.

"It looks like we only have another three minutes of fuel in the other tank. I suggest we use it." The captain pushed the throttle for the right engine to increases power. Then the captain begin to lower the nose of the plane to decrease there altitude. At first all they could see was the white mist of the clouds around them. But after what seemed like an eternity, the plane burst through the clouds into open air. Bato and captain smith finally had a clean view outside. They could see the black, freezing ocean behind them, with the moon light reflecting off its surface. Just a mile in front of them was the dark, white, tundra, shores of Antarctica. Scattered along the coastline, was the small lights of the fishing villages that continued for miles in every direction. And beyond that, a large cluster of bright lights and structures that seemed like an oasis of light in a dark void.

"The water tribe capital, we made it." Bato said as he took in the friendly sites of home again. But as Bato looked closer he could see small flashes of light and sparks coming from the village. It wasn't long before they could see that the lights were explosions and gunfire. The fire nation had begun there attack on the water tribe. As the aircraft shot over the village, the captain pointed out the window

"There's the runway, do you see it." Bato took a closer look out the window. Immediately he too could see the familiar stretch of runway lights just to the west of the capital city lights.

Then the ATC's voice came on the radio again. "_South artic 2378, we have you on radar, 8 miles out, would you like to do a visual approach?" _this time, Bato responded.

"Antarctic international, affirmative on the visual approach, our left engine has failed due to fuel starvation. Right engine is down to just 3 minutes of fuel. We will probably be doing a dead stick landing."

"_South artic 2378, confirm whether or not you can make the runway."_ Bato looked at the fuel level on the computer screen and saw that the right engine only had 5 pounds left. Only seconds until they would run out completely.

"Antarctic international, we are going to try to make the runway, If not possible will put it down as close to the runway as possible."

"Affirmative_ flight 2378, begin your approach, runway 2-left Baring 310, and good luck"_ as the controller signed off, Bato heard a familiar whistling sound from outside. Suddenly the plane was rocked by a violent impact. The entire aircraft trembled as the sound of ripping metal filled Bato's ears. Then the plane began to nosedive towards the uninhabited valley between the villages and the capital, out of control. After five seconds of freefalling, the plane hit a snow bank. The impact caused Bato's head to smack the steering column with a loud "CRACK" and everything went dark.

Commander Dread was looked outside to see flight 2378 as it continued its final approach. He had been given the job of clearing the airspace around the southern water tribe capital, and to act as a military liaison at the airport. He was in charge of evacuating the civilians of this airport if and when the fire nation's attacking forces would break through to the airport. Though he would have preferred a front line position, Dread also appreciated the importance of this job to. He returned his attention to the 767 as it slowly descended towards the airport. As the flight got closer thou, Dread noticed a light in the background of his binoculars. It was just behind the plane and moving. At first Dread thought it was a lens flare from the planes landing lights. But it wasn't behaving like a flare. It was traveling faster than the airliner and was getting brighter as it got closer. It had a bright fiery orange glow and was heeding directly for the plane. Suddenly it dawned on Dread what the light actually was. He grabbed the radio to call the flight. "Flight 2378, bank right, immediately!" but there was no response from the radio. Dread looked out the window with his binoculars and caught a glimpse of the light as it cut through the night sky and made contact with the plane just between the tail and wings. Instantly the plane snapped in half like a toothpick, sending small burning pieces of the plane raining down from the sky. The largest one that Dread could make out was the tail, which fell to the ground like a rock, crashing into the cluster of igloos and tents near the shore. As the debris fell to the ground, Dread saw the front of the plane still in the air. The entire tail was gone along with most of the rear fuselage, the right wing was on fire, and the plane was nose diving towards a large snow bank. After a few seconds of falling, the plane crashed into the top of a hill of snow at an angle were it destroyed the hilltop and slid down the hillside, breaking up into two pieces before eventually coming to a stop; The fuselage, with the wings still attached, was sprawled on the snow covered ground. The nose and cockpit had been thrown clear 100 feet away and was now half buried in snow. Dread quickly surveyed the crash site as best as he could. He could see through the light of the moon that, despite the devastation of the impact, the fuselage pieces was roughly intact without any indication of fire present. There could be survivors. Dread grabbed the phone next to his desk. "All emergency personnel, incoming flight 2378 has crashed ½ mile from the runway. Proceed to crash site and search for survivors." Dread hung up the phone and then reached for a military radio. "All units in sector 12, an inbound fight has been shot down by the fire nation. The tail section of this plane has crashed in sector 12 near the beach. If possible proceed to the crash site and evacuate anyone you can find." Dread put the radio on his desk. Then he sat down in his desk chair and rubbed his eyes with stress and frustration. "It's going to be one of those nights isn't it?"


End file.
